As far as I can tell, the build is no longer viable as of 3.4. The nerfs to spell block make it impossible for the build to function vs spell heavy enemies, which means you just end up dead if you try to tank.

I may update the build later on, but as far as I can tell. The damage is significant and it's no longer worth it to continue the build. RIP in peace, Aegis Aurora.

Introduction
I've always loved aegis aurora builds and I wanted to make one viable for this league. It was difficult, but I made it work using Scorching Ray and a ton of ES and armor using the Guardian Ascendency 'Radiant Faith' which converts reserved mana into ES and reserved health into armor.

You are semi-immortal and can take on the rippiest map mods with all the hardest mods to ever grace human eyes.

It combines all the greatest traits from all the tank builds in the game. It has the armor of a Juggernaut, the Max-Block of a Gladiator, and an effective life and regen to that of a RF Chieftain.

It uses all these layers of extreme mitigation to be able to facetank nearly everything. You don't need to play it well. You click and move. You are immune to most types of damage. Everything dies eventually.

It has more than enough dps to kill all the bosses and complete all the content. It allows many players a lot of leeway if they want to get used to all the tough fight mechanics, especially if its their first time.

The only con is that the dps is very low compared to the meta, but if you want to be immune to almost anything or have terrible connection then this is the build for you. It is like switching on godmode on the league.

And lastly its a pokemon master. You can literally punch anything with your default attack to 1% health and throw a net on it to guarantee capture, since you don't have to worry about dying to any of its attacks.

And since it's difficult to die. This makes this build hardcore friendly.

There are a few variations of the build that you can choose from. Hopefully, it's not that confusing. I tried to list down the pros and cons of each version. The CI Version is the most defensive version of this build, but has much lower dps.

Note: Variations of the build that have not been tested yet, but should work in theory. These builds are not recommended unless you have a good understanding of PoE and are just here for people who like theorycrafting.

Soul of Solaris. To take no extra damage from critical strikes. We have 5 reckless defense jewels to give us 100% spell block. So, every hit that hits us will be a critical strike.

Bandits

Spoiler

Kill All

Flasks:

Spoiler

Witchbrew is required to kill bosss. You also need an anti-bleed, anti-ignite to prevent DoTs which are the only things that can kill you. Also, one flask for anti-freeze.

Freeze will be the most annoying ailment on you since you'll be frozen often due to crit, but won't take any damage cuz you can't die. So, being chain frozen is the worst thing ever.

You'll also want at least one mana flask that recharges per critical hit you've taken for no regen maps. So, as long as something in the map attacks you, you regain mana. No regen maps are easy for you.

Useful Lab Enchants:

Spoiler

Gloves:
Word of Light which drops consecrated ground (4% extra hp regen) for 5 seconds when you take a critical strike. You can get it off the first lab, at lvl 33.
Boots:
2% Life and Mana when Hit.

Slayer builds have culling 20%, which kills players instantly if they have less than 20% life. Even if you have 9,000 ES. You will die instantly if your health is below 20%. I like to leave 30% of my life or more instead of the usual 99% reserved, so I know I'm in the clear.

There are a few arrow ele builds with ridiculous damage, like danzig that can mow you down. Make sure you focus on them. You'll never die to a one-shot, you are too tanky, so you'll always have at least 3-4 good seconds to react and get out of the way or kill them.

There is are burning/degen spellcasters that can burn a ton of your life quickly. Make sure you have elemental-resist/bleed/poison and chaos flasks if your not at max chaos resist if you see your life drop. Also, keep moving as some degens like the chaos one, is cast on the ground your standing on. So as long as you move, you don't take any extra damage.

You can also use Enduring Cry, to help you regen some of that life.

Exploding/Minion Instability Summoner GM Builds are rare, but they take a chuck out of your life if their zombies blow up in your face. Just take care when you see zombies as 3 exploding ones can put a big hurt on you.

Thank you for the build guide, looks solid. I may have some questions for you to improve the guide a bit, but otherwise it is quite good. I will return when I have a bit more time to share some critique for you.

Cheers

*edits*
Yay, I get time to comment a bit.

I had also tried theorycrafting a high-armour ES build this league, and 'on paper' made something like 250k armour possible But it definitely wasn't worth it. I'm glad you figured out how much armour was 'ideal' and based the concept around that.

Curiously, do you think you could take this into HoGM and make a video for us?

Thank you for the build guide, looks solid. I may have some questions for you to improve the guide a bit, but otherwise it is quite good. I will return when I have a bit more time to share some critique for you.

Cheers

*edits*
Yay, I get time to comment a bit.

I had also tried theorycrafting a high-armour ES build this league, and 'on paper' made something like 250k armour possible But it definitely wasn't worth it. I'm glad you figured out how much armour was 'ideal' and based the concept around that.

Curiously, do you think you could take this into HoGM and make a video for us?

edited: Adding details from HoGM to guide. Did a few runs and it went well.

I've finished updating the guide along with a video of my first complete HoGM run. I did a few after to see if it would vary a bit, but all runs have been pretty smooth ever since I figured out Slayers have 20% culling.

Notes and tips from my HoGM runs are now added to the guide as well as my experience. On the flip side, this is the first time I've finished HoGM. Very nice!

And as the build has a easy time with HoGM. I think I can now officially label this build a HoGM farmer.

I'll see if I can add a leveling guide, but the general idea is to level up as a Righteous Fire / Scorching Ray build. We use most of the same skill tree nodes. And once we hit around level 75 and can equip Chayula's Presence, Shav's Vestments, and 5 Reckless Defense Jewels.

We are safe to refund our skill tree and switch over to this build. The reason we don't just level up using this build's tree is because many of the defensive qualities of this build come from the items. Chayula's Presence gives you a ton of your ES at least 1/3rd of it. And the 5 Reckless Defense Jewels make this build immortal, but only immortal after you have enough armor and Aegis Aurora.

All of these are not going be present while leveling up. So, it's best to use another build that can level-up easily and then switch over to this one, once your ready.

And again, I'm not the greatest at leveling up. So anyone wants to help me put together something better. I'm more then happy to add it to the guide. This is just how I leveled up my character.

And worst change is putting almost all bosses in new version of maps into fucking small areas, where you can't kite well or dodge stuff. What a terrible idiot invented that I want say to him: dude flick you, seriously flick you very much.

Yup. We take the vertex for the +1 gems for our auras. It also gives us a nice boost to both armor and es. If we take a pure ES helmet and don't use vertex. We lose about 8k armor. It won't kill the build to lose vertex though. 50k+ is more then enough to use aegis. So, it's a personal preference and not required.

"

Also what order would you recommend we take our ascendancy?

It should be Radiant Faith -> Time of Need -> Unwavering Faith -> Bastion of Hope

Is this build Shaper-viable? Given the relatively low DPS, I guess the fight would be pretty long so the room will most likely be full of degen vortex. Can we survive that. Also it's likely Zana won't stay alive so we'll need to tank the bullet hell ourselves?